For efficiency and cost reduction, some telecommunications providers bind subscribers to specific policy and charging rules function (PCRF) servers selected from a pool of PCRF servers for the telecommunications network, e.g., a long-term evolution (LTE) network. The PCRF is configured to make and manage policy decisions for the bound subscribers, so it can be more efficient in terms of computing and network resources for a subscriber to always use the same PCRF server. By binding subscribers to specific PCRF servers, different PCRF servers do not have to retrieve and maintain the data for subscribers bound to other PCRF servers.
Some telecommunications providers require that an access point name (APN) be provided to generate and/or locate subscriber bindings. However, if a policy related node does not have access to APN information, the policy related node cannot generate and/or locate subscriber bindings in those scenarios.
Accordingly, there exists a need for methods, systems, and computer readable media for using APN independent subscriber bindings.